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THE immortal story of Wake Island was written first, with bullets, blood and boundless courage, by a gallant band of United States Marines and their valiant civilian comrades on a tiny coral island in the Pacific last December.
Paramount's "Wake Island" is that same story, faithfully retold in photoplay form. Produced by Joseph Sistrom and directed by John Farrow, "Wake Island" was made as a factual film chronicle, an authentic picturization of America at war-the first since a Japanese stab in the hack last December 7 changed the course of history.
The United States Marine Corps helped make the war epic an authoritative account of the historic defense of Wake Island by participating with men and machines in the production of the picture based on the Corps' official records. Approval of the screen play, written by W. R. Burnett and Frank Butler, was given by the Marine headquarters before the studio started making a foot of film. The U. S. M. C. appointed a technical staff to assist in making the picture, including Lieutenant Colonel Francis E. Pierce, who remained with the first production unit during the entire filming.
A special weapons detail of selected Marines from Camp Elliott, near San Diego, manned machine guns in land battle scenes. A squadron of eight Grumman fighter planes staged spectacular dog-fights with a group of Ryan SC low-wing monoplanes painted to duplicate the Japanese Nakijima 96 planes. A five-inch Naval gun of the same model as used by the heroic defenders of Wake to blast Nipponese warships from the shore was emplaced and fired by Marine crews. A giant PBY Navy patrol plane also was "cast" in the picture.
Three location sites were used in the filming of "Wake Island"-the Salton Sea in the California desert, where the principal exterior shots were made, the Great Salt Lake in Utah where aerial battles were waged and a coastal firing range near San Diego where the big gun was fired.
Brian Donlevy portrayed the commander of the valorous Marine garrison which in the dark days when the fall of the island to the overwhelming superior attackers was near sent ringing around the world their challenging war cry:
"Send us more Japs!"
While no attempt was made at personal...